The Effects of Using Multimodal Approaches in Meaning-Making of 21st Century Literacy Texts Among ESL Students in a Private School in Malaysia

In today’s globalised digital era, students are inevitably engaged in various multimodal texts due to their active participation in social media and frequent usage of mobile devices on a daily basis. Such daily activities advocate the need for a transformation in the teaching and learning of ESL lessons in order to promote students’ capabilities in making meaning of different literacy texts which students come across in their ESL learning activities. This paper puts forth the framework of Multimodality in the restructuring of the teaching and learning of ESL with the aim of investigating its effects and students perspectives on the use of multimodal approaches underlying the Multiliteracies theory. Using focus group interviews, this qualitative case study examines the effectiveness of ESL teaching and learning using the Multimodal approaches on literacy in meaning-making among 15 students in a private school in Penang, Malaysia. The results confirm the need to reorientate the teaching and learning of ESL with the focus on multimodal pedagogical practices as it promotes positive learning outcomes among students. The implications of this study suggest that the multimodal approaches integrated in the teaching and learning of ESL have the capacity to promote students’ autonomy in learning, improve motivation to learn and facilitate various learning styles. Keywords: Multimodal Approaches; Multiliteracies; Monomodal; Flipped Classroom; Literacy; Multimodal texts; Ipad